[SOURIS]

Hello All, I kept chickens as a child and we always fed them household scraps - they ate plenty of meaty remains - raw prawns and whitebait, curries etc etc. Now after a 10 year break (university, starting career, living in rented accommodation) I am once again a proud chicken owner! My husband has never kept chickens before so I got a couple of poultry books ... and discover that there have been a few changes since I last consulted these tomes ... one of the main ones being that we are not supposed to feed any meat scraps to chickens...

I have read (actually on this site) that that's because of BSE - I don't understand how this works if we only eat our chickens' eggs. Does anyone know this? And if it's  not because odf BSE, then what is wrong with it?

Thanks all.

[Aunt Sally]

Munty will put us right on this.  

It is to prevent transmission up the food chain.  Farmers feeding meat which could be infected to other livestock which then go onto the markednfor human consumption.  

It's not really intended to include us feeding a bit of left over sunday dinner to our backyard hens.  I think we can assume that meat bought for human consumption is of no risk.

Having said that I'm sure DEFRA make no exceptions.

[muntjac]

what i said was its as a result of bse and all the other problems feeding meat back to the animal species in the post .  when they brought out the rules they  said it was illegal to feeed meat remains to any stock . so taking this in its broadest aspect it includes chickens . chicken and other animal carcasses were rendered down etc and used as protien in animal feed this is what led to the bse outbreak . what i am saying is this a chicken is a seed eater  and insects form a part of its diet . other chickens and meat dont  it does not eat its brother unles there are maggots on the body . if you want to fed meat to your birds i wont tell on you  but niether would i want to eat the eggs as a result .salmonella is transmitted in eggs so whats to stop any other virus doing so as well    

[mercury]

I've hung left over chicken carcases in my run for years, with no ill affects, the hens love to pick at them, keeps them busy too.  

[muntjac]

I've hung left over chicken carcases in my run for years, with no ill affects, the hens love to pick at them, keeps them busy too.  

im guessing its cooked chicken . well as i said its not summat id do .

[Trillium]

Out of curiosity, wouldn't feeding meat to chickens intensify cannabilistic tendencies in them? They naturally do that to weaklings among them, but wouldn't this incite more problems than you'd want?
When I had chickens, I gave them the normal feeds and seeds, along with outside runs and garden bugs tossed in for treats. Coops were kept dry and clean. The processing laws changed here even for home growers so I had to send my meat birds out for commercial processing and to my great surprise, one was disposed of as having diptheria - and I had to pay 5 quid for the disposal. Afterwards I was glad I sent them out, otherwise, I'd have never know of the problem and eaten the bird.

[muntjac]

could do  not encountered it myself  for chickens top get feding on their mates ur not watching them properly in my thinking

[SOURIS]

Thanks for all these replies. I think for now I will steer clear of feeding them meat. When they free range they do eat frogs, mice and birds so I don't think meat is unnatural to them but just to be sure I won't give them any.

[muntjac]

the stuff they eat in the wild is fine  souris . its what meat the humans interfere with i am talking about